Meet the editors

Dr. Shashank Shekhar Solankey is presently working as Assistant Professor–cum–Jr. Scientist (Horticulture: Vegetable Science) at Bihar Agricultural University (BAU), Sabour (Bhagalpur), India. He received a doctorate in Horticulture from Banaras Hindu University, Varanasi. He has more than seven years of experience in teaching and research. His research focus is improvement of vegetable crops, especially tomato and okra. Dr. Solankey was

awarded the Best Teacher Award and Best Researcher Award in 2016 by BAU, and has twelve other prestigious awards. He has published fifty-five research/review papers, one souvenir paper, six books, one abstract book, and thirty-three book chapters. He is young, dynamic, and wishes to flourish in the field of academia and publications.

Dr. Shirin Akhtar is an enthusiastic and young faculty member at Bihar Agricultural University (BAU), Sabour, Bhagalpur, India. Her field of specialization is vegetable breeding. She received a PhD from Bidhan Chandra Krishi Viswavidyalaya, Mohanpur, West Bengal. Her areas of research are biotic and abiotic stress resistance as well as quality improvement in vegetables, particularly solanaceous crops and okra. She is engaged in teaching under-

graduate, postgraduate, and PhD courses and mentoring postgraduate and doctoral students towards new research ideas. She has authored two books, ten book chapters, more than forty research articles in journals of national and international repute, and several popular articles and folders.

Dr. Alejandro Isabel Luna Maldonado received a PhD in Agricultural Sciences from Kyushu University, Fukuoka, Japan, in 2009. He began his career as a lecturer in the Department of Agricultural Engineering at the Autonomous University of Nuevo León in 1992 and was trained in the design and automation of agro-industrial machinery at the Japan International Cooperation Agency. Professor Luna Maldonado became an assistant professor in 1996 and a

professor in 2018. He has published thirty-three articles, five book chapters, and four books. He has advised six doctoral theses, five master's theses, and three undergraduate theses. He has served as the head of the educational program of Food Industry Engineering, which has been internationally accredited by Accreditation Board for Engineering and Technology (ABET), since 2009. He has been a member of the Mexican Council of Science and Technology since 2012, and the Program for the Development Teaching Professional (PRODEP) since 2003. He has also been a member of the American Society of Agricultural Engineering since 2012, and the Japanese Society of Agricultural Machinery since 2007.

Dr. Humberto Rodriguez-Fuentes is Professor of Environment and Sustainability at the Autonomous University of Nuevo León, Mexico. He graduated with a doctorate in Agricultural Sciences with a specialty in Water-Soil from the same university. He has forty years of experience in teaching and research. His research is mainly focused in the area of plant factories for the production of highly nutritious vegetables. Since 1990 he has been a national researcher distinguished by the government of Mexico in Biotechnology and Agricultural Sciences. He has published six textbooks, twelve book chapters, and more than fifty articles in journals with strict national/international arbitration. He is also the editor of three books with international distribution.

Juan Antonio Vidales Contreras, MSc, PhD is an agricultural engineer. Since 1985, he has been a full-time professor at the School of Agronomy at the Autonomous University of Nuevo Leon (UANL), Mexico. He received an Agronomy Engineer degree at the same university on 1984. His PhD was awarded by the University of Arizona in 2001. Dr. Vidales Contreras has published more than fifty original research papers in indexed journals, five book chapters,

Contents

**Section 1**

**Preface XI**

A. Components of Urban Gardens **1**

**Chapter 1 3**

**Chapter 2 15**

**Chapter 3 27**

**Chapter 4 51**

**Chapter 5 75**

**Chapter 6 97**

B. Potential and Scope of Urban Horticulture **105**

**Chapter 7 107**

Nutrients for Hydroponic Systems in Fruit Crops

Hydroponic Systems for Arabidopsis Extended to Crop Plants

*by Alejandro Isabel Luna Maldonado, Julia Mariana Márquez Reyes,* 

Automation and Robotics Used in Hydroponic System

*Juan Antonio Vidales Contreras and Urbano Luna Maldonado*

Nutritive Solutions Formulated from Organic Fertilizers

*by Adriana Maria dos Santos, Mariana Paiva Baracuhy, Dermeval Araújo Furtado, Romulo Wilker Neri de Andrade,*

Urban Horticulture in Sub-Saharan Africa

Installation of Vegetable Based Roof Gardens in Schools From

 *Jackson Rômulo de Sousa Leite and Fabiana Terezinha Leal de Morais*

Application of Nanotechnology Solutions in Plants Fertilization *by Daniela Predoi, Rodica V. Ghita, Simona Liliana Iconaru, Carmen Laura Cimpeanu and Stefania Mariana Raita*

*Héctor Flores Breceda, Humberto Rodríguez Fuentes,* 

*by Pramod Kumar and Simran Saini*

*by Juan Carlos Rodríguez Ortiz*

Recyclable Materials: A Study

**Section 2**

*by Ifeoluwapo Amao*

*by Lawrence Griffing and Krishna Kumar*

and has participated and contributed in more than twenty scientific meetings.

Julia Mariana Márquez Reyes obtained a PhD in Biotechnology from Autonomous University of Nuevo Leon (UANL), Mexico, in 2013. She specializes in bioreactors with anaerobic activity for the removal of contaminants, phytoremediation for the control of heavy metals in water and soil, enzymatic activity and antioxidant capacity of plant organisms used in environmental biotechnology, and development of sustainable technologies. She began her

career as a lecturer of Balance of Matter and Energy, Unit Operations, Environmental Microbiology at UANL. Dr. Márquez Reyes became an assistant professor in 2018. She has been a member of the Mexican Council for Science and Technology since 2009. She has published six scientific papers and one book chapter.
